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#1 Teen Violence - Solutions: Kick the Fake Heroes and Bring in the Real Heroes
Teen Violence: Kick the Fake Heroes, Bring in the Real Heroes |
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Charity Begins at Home |
Another shooting has happened in Georgia, just a month after the Columbine Massacre in Colorado! It is another teen violence and exercise of anger and release through violent behavior! When I mentioned to Linda, a friend that there is going to be many more shootings inside schools, she sounded like, "How can you be so cruel." I'm a realist and I don't believe in denial. There are three main forces affecting children and teen violence in this country and we are not yet ready to confront those forces - - we are in denial.
Great Denial: We are in denial that crimes are committed only by minorities and they are nuisances to society - - - they should all be locked up. This notion is not unusual because instead of looking at real problems, we look for somebody or something else to blame and the real problems go unresolved. Years ago, the media helped to create this frenzy that minorities are the only ones dealing in drugs and the problem went untouched for a long time. Just in the same way, we refused to pay serious attention to teen violence. By the time we woke up to the reality that drugs are being used by a large number of middle and upper class Whites, it became a national epidemic. Despite this, the law created by the Congress put more minorities in jail while Whites received a slap on the hand.
After all the painful denial about crime and violence, the inner cities are not the only breeding ground for crimes. The plague has now visited the counties and is afflicting children from the affluent families. The epidemic of national shootings in schools is not surprising. The same problem plaguing the children in the inner cities is now affecting children from the suburbs. Something is now clear! Coming from a two uncaring parent family is as devastating to a child just the same way with a kid coming from the inner city from a single parent family headed by a woman. The result is juvenile delinquency!
"When good people keep quiet, the voice of evil will grow louder" -- 'Yinka Vidal, author of Overcoming the Invisible Crime.
Four Powerful forces affecting teen violence.
 | We need to kick the fake heroes and bring in the real heroes! Just because a person is good on the field or able to shoot ball in the net does not mean this is an appropriate role model for our children. Parents should be the role models for their children not the sports or movie stars. However, society idolizes these fake heroes because they make money for the business. Consequently, we have sacrificed the welfare of our children for the idolatry of money, power, and fame. |
| We need to teaching children how to deal with anger: We have a culture of violence and winning at all costs as Europe has clearly demonstrated since the World Wars. I was appalled as NATO continues to bomb a nation for so long killing many innocent people and we are talking about how do we define the winner. This is very absurd! We now derive more pleasure from killing innocent people at the same time worrying about our ego of who is winning the war! If ego is bursting our heads so much that we can not see straight, how in the world do we expect our children to deal with anger? NATO's idea of protecting the Albanians from ethnic cleansing by Milosevic was an applaudable idea, but it has now turned to an ego exercise of power by NATO. When adults do not give good examples, how in the world do we expect children to do the right thing? |
| Society need to stop the mad worry of hurting the male ego: Undoubtedly many women have displaced men from jobs and are now at the mercy of the female's economic power. These hurting males have continuously reflected their anger to children and we wonder why some male children are angry at minorities and women. Perhaps males have to learn to swallow their egos and teach their children to respect the changing times when females are taking economic control of the families. |
| Congress must act now to stop the prevalence of guns in society: Gun prevalence makes it easier for anybody to resort to violence with guns. However, because of ideological madness, we do not have enough guts to put the proliferation of dangerous weapons under control. We are not serious about crime control! Although the Constitution guarantees the right to bear alms, it did not guarantee the right to build an armory in the homes like we have allowed today. The extremism of ideologies create the death of common sense! The question to ask is, "America, Do we love guns more than we love our children?" |
The Media's Role: There is no doubt that the way news is reported today create an atmosphere for children to model after bad heroes. I remember when Timothy McVey was sentenced to death, one of the news reporter said, "He remained unshaken by the sentence like he has always been -- very conservative." Today, the word "conservative" has been given the most horrible meaning since the time of the World Wars. What in the world is so conservative about a mass murderer?
After reporting the news about a shooting, the media should immediately follow with a news segment on punishment by electrocution -- taking the camera to electric chair. The news should emphasize the punishment for murder and interview people who have committed murder on death row and how they dread the day of their ultimate fate. Many intended copy-cat children would be scared! There is nothing that scares children more than showing the ultimate punishment for murder is death by hanging!
Solutions: If we are serious about teen violence with guns, we will control guns so they will not get in the hands of criminals or children.
We need to kick the fake heroes and bring in the real heroes into the classrooms! There are many people who wrote books about bad experiences that happened to them and how they learned to cope with life. These are the people that should be in the classrooms teaching children how to handle anger, stress, failures and loneliness. Get the book Overcoming the Invisible Crime. It is the autobiography of a lab manager that learned to remained calm despite different adversities on the job.There are people who walked through fire to save lives and police officers who rescued people under dangerous situations. But, will we have enough strength to kick the fake heroes?
Ethics should be included as part of the school curriculum where children are taught about what is right and wrong thereby raising and developing human conscience. Teen violence will not happen when a conscience has been created in a child about right and wrong. If we refuse to teach our children about respect for others how will they know it is wrong to kill innocent students? Parents have contributed to supporting their children when they do the wrong thing or take advantage of other children. In this way, the children become the extension of the parents' ego. Teen violence should not take us by surprise.
Finally, when we took God out of the schools, we let satan inside the classrooms. We can not ignore children's need for spiritual expression and healing. It helps them to develop conscience and respect for themselves and others. Spiritual development is one of the fundamental values children need to learn. It is a very important part of child development that has been ignored today. When we refuse to surrender the children to God, satan takes them from our hands -- and we are still wondering about the reasons for these shootings!
Article by Victor Vidal
